Lecture by Kajri Jain and Book Signing with Dayanita Singh
Gropius Bau, Cinema (Lower Ground Floor) | Saturday 25 June, 2022
Lecture 3pm-4pm CEST, Book Signing, 4.15pm-6pm CEST
Museums, public art, and the discipline of art history have been at the centre of recent moves to “decolonize” institutions. Such moves must go beyond the mere inclusion of artists from historically marginalized groups or regions, to rethink the very methods, narratives and presuppositions of art history. Taking its cue from Dayanita Singh’s exhibition Dancing with my Camera, this talk outlines some of the ways in which a practice like hers challenges how we think and speak about art and photography.
In her lecture, art historian Kajri Jain discusses how Dayanita Singh’s practice challenges our understanding of photography and art. She is the author of the essay “Photography Beyond the Photograph: Dayanita Singh’s Theory of Photography”, which is part of the new exhibition catalogue Dayanita Singh: Dancing with my Camera (2022). The lecture is followed by a book signing with artist Dayanita Singh.
Dayanita Singh lives and works in New Delhi, India. She studied Visual Communication at the National Institute of Design in Ahmedabad and Photojournalism and Documentary Photography at the International Center of Photography in New York. Recent solo exhibitions include: Dayanita Singh: Pothi Khana, Minneapolis Institute of Art (2021); Museum Bhavan, Tokyo Photographic Art Museum (2017). She is the 2022 recipient of the Hasselblad Award.
Kajri Jain is Professor of Art History and Visual Studies at the University of Toronto. She works on images across art, religion, politics, and vernacular business cultures in India. Her publications include Gods in the Time of Democracy (Duke University Press, 2021), Gods in the Bazaar: The Economies of Indian Calendar Art (Duke University Press, 2007), and articles in Art History, Third Text, Current Anthropology, Capitalism and the Camera, and the Cambridge Companion to Modern Indian Culture.
After the lecture, Dayanita Singh – who describes herself as a “bookmaker” – will sign copies of the exhibition catalogue.
The new publication is available at the Walther König Bookshop on-site and on the museum website.
